What to do if you eat for happiness

A crazy thing can happen when you work on improving your eating behaviors: you learn all sorts of quirks about yourself.

Procrastination, you were making me eat?!

Every time my kid starts yelling, into the kitchen I go... Who knew?

Gosh I am so tired at 4 pm.... huh, I guess would normally eat now even though if I'm honest I'm not hungry, just drained.

Luckily, this is a really common fork in the road. One where millions of people have stood before you, pondering the options. Do we continue eating in those situations, and if not, then what? Fortunately, the reasons you want to eat are probably similar to other people's reasons, so you don't have to figure it out from scratch! (Here's a default process you can use)

​But let's say you have narrowed it down, and it hits you: you're using food for happiness. Let's talk it through.

The first questions I ask my clients in this situation involve the efficacy of the food solution.

(I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that food is ineffective, because that's not always the case. )

Is food making you happier? Some of the time, all the time, none of the time? When does it work or not work?Does any and all food work, or only certain types of food?​

Next, I'd look for the pattern of when you are turning to food for happiness. This will help shed on clues on how it's functioning for you.

Are you turning to food for happiness on a day to day, regular, reliable basis, sort of as a baseline keep-my-day-interesting tactic?Or are you turning for food to joy in a reactive sense, to help soothe you after particularly saddening episodes or events?Are you using food to go along with another enjoyable thing (movies, company, weekend) to make it better?

Third, I'd explore what happiness means to you.

What besides food makes you feel happy? (If you can't think of anything else that makes you happy, that's okay, and not an unheard of answer.) If you wanted to make a dear friend feel happy, how would you go about doing it?

With this information, we have a lot to go on. In my next post, I'll go through what you might have answered, and where we could go in different scenarios. Stay tuned.